Not all of the questions that I answer come to me from the Ask Andy portal. This question came to me from the ArmaKleen website contact info form.
I was asked how much ArmaKleen M-Aero would be needed to fill an 80 gallon parts washer. The normal recommended concentration for ArmaKleen M-Aero is 10%, so I instructed the customer that they should use 8 gallons of M-Aero with 72 gallons of water.
The customer had a follow up question. They wanted my recommendation as to the concentration of ArmaKleen M-Aero they should add daily to maintain their bath level of cleaner in their parts washer. The customer correctly realized that their bath would evaporate since it was heated. The customer was concerned that if 10% M-Aero was added every day to make up for the evaporation that the bath would become over concentrated.
This was a very good observation. The customer is right. If he was to keep adding 10% ArmaKleen M-Aero he would over-concentrate his bath and would do so very quickly.
I told the customer that he should only add water to make up for bath evaporation. Water is the only volatile ingredient in the ArmaKleen M-Aero cleaner. It is the only volatile ingredient in our other ArmaKleen aqueous cleaners as well. The rest of the “soap” is not volatile and does not evaporate.
I also told the customer that they will also learn that over time their bath will lose concentration due to carry off on the parts that are cleaned. To determine when you do need to add more cleaner it is a good practice to learn how to titrate their bath and to do so on a bi-weekly basis. That way they can make adjustments to their bath with small amounts of additional chemistry as needed to maintain cleaning performance throughout the life of the bath. You can find additional information on how to titrate your bath by clicking here.
